Professor Mark Walker from Union College in the USA and a world authority on the Nazi German atomic bomb project visited Sweden and the Center for the History of Science in May. He has recently published the book Hitler’s Atomic Bomb: History, Legend, and the Twin Legacies of Auschwitz and Hiroshima by Cambridge University Press.
He lectured in the Linnaeus Hall on Tuesday 20 May about:
History and Legend: Werner Heisenberg’s 1941 Visit with Niels Bohr in Occupied Copenhagen
In September of 1941, Werner Heisenberg visited Niels Bohr in occupied Denmark and told him that he believed that atomic bombs were feasible and the Germans were working on them. According to the legend of Copenhagen, Heisenberg did this in order to gain Bohr’s help in convincing all physicists to not work on nuclear weapons. This talk will place this visit into the context of Heisenberg’s many foreign trips during the war in order to scrutinize both the legend and actual history of Copenhagen.
Thursday 22 May, he also lectured at the Department of History of Ideas and Science in Uppsala on: